


The Contract

by ArgentNoelle



Series: How Not to Spend Eternity [2]
Category: Kuroshitsuji | Black Butler
Genre: Adult Ciel Phantomhive, Childhood Trauma, Ciel Phantomhive is Annoyed, Ciel wonders about Sebastian, Demon Ciel Phantomhive, Demon Deals, Demons, Dubious Consent, Female Ciel Phantomhive, First Time, Flirting, Gen, Genderswap, Identity Issues, Love, M/M, Master/Servant, Non-Chronological, Obsession, POV Ciel Phantomhive, Poor Ciel Phantomhive, Post-Canon, Post-Season/Series 02, Seduction, So is Claude but he's dead, Wishes, hunger, sebastian is a bastard, sin - Freeform, temporary genderswap
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-16
Updated: 2018-07-16
Packaged: 2019-06-11 14:41:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,584
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15317715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArgentNoelle/pseuds/ArgentNoelle
Summary: Ciel makes his way through his first contract. If only he had Sebastian with him, this might all be easier.





	1. His Wife, Doing Her Duty

**Author's Note:**

> This story takes place between chapters 7 & 8 of "Do Not Stand At My Grave And Weep" but reads better if you read it after the entire first one.

_ The man screamed, one arm reaching to scrabble at the edge of his shoulder, which burned under his clothes as the contract mark was formed. And even Ciel stumbled, caught off-guard by the magic that flowed between them, the almost palpable chain that seemed to tug them together. He blinked, and shuddered, looking down at the back of his own uncovered hand, where a sharply pointed star was glowing a blinding purple. It’s done, he thought, almost in shock. I made a contract… he is mine now… _

 

The pentagram was still there, though dormant and ink-black, as Sebastian’s was, from Ciel’s few memories of the butler’s hand uncovered. It seemed to have  _ weight _ to it, some unerring force that told Ciel where Edwin was, what he was desiring. Nothing, at the moment—the man was asleep, the flickers of half-formed wishes sparking at the edge of Ciel’s mind as he dreamed.

It was a simple enough contract. This man had no desire for revenge, no hidden, darkened past. Only a father who had gambled away the family’s money and an ambition to match his name, if not his means, by any price. What a fleeting thing to give up an immortal soul for—just a small, short time on this earth being envied, rich, successful. When he was gone, what would be left of this deal? What memories, what influence would he leave behind? 

His skin itched, pulling down upon its new-formed bones; Ciel kept trying to shift his form to something more amenable without realizing it, and it irritated him both that he kept forgetting that was no longer possible and that it  _ was _ no longer possible, his form constricted by Edwin’s expectations. The late-summer air was heavy and thick, it whispered through the open windows of Ciel’s small chamber, inviting him to join it, bringing in the heady scent of flowers, touched with sun-dry ground.

A bigger house would be the first thing Ciel would arrange for, as soon as the pieces he’d set in motion began to move. By the end of the month, Edwin Brown would have enough money to set up in a better part of the city, by the next month he would be able to gather attention, if he played his cards right, and Ciel would play them.

You see? Ciel thought, defiantly. I am perfectly able to take care of this contract, whatever you may think, Sebastian.

Of course, the room remained empty, and no answer came.

 

_ “Is that all?” Ciel said, with a sigh. “Greed. How petty.” _

_ “Do we have a deal, demon?” the man persisted. _

_ “Young master,” Sebastian’s voice came whispering out of the dark, twining around them so that the man jumped and stared around wildly. “I can’t help but think you do not know what you are doing.” _

_ “Did I give you leave to speak, Sebastian?” Ciel said.  _

_ Sebastian did not reply.  _

_ “There are two of you?” the man asked, struggling in vain to peer through the encompassing darkness. _

_ “That one belongs to me,” Ciel said. “Take no notice of him. —And,” he grinned, shaking the man’s hand, “I accept your offer.” _

 

“Margaret, dearest,” Edwin said with that uneasy mix of superiority and wariness, “when I said that you should be my wife I didn’t mean it to be only a business arrangement.”

“I think I’ve taken care of more than business,” Ciel said, trying to keep the snappish tone out of his voice. It amazed him how much Edwin always  _ wanted _ . “I’ve accompanied you to every social event on your calendar,” he said, meekly, and laced his fingers together, looking down at them so that if he forgot himself and let his eyes flash, Edwin might not notice.

Ciel hated social events. They were not any more tolerable as the wife of new money than as a child earl. They were, perhaps, even more dull and insipid than he recalled, full of gossip and fashion and women he despised.

“That’s business, Maggie,” Edwin said, with the slightest bit of amusement in his voice. He walked over, putting an arm around Ciel’s shoulders until Ciel finally huffed and allowed it.

Well, perhaps technically.

“I don’t see what you have a problem with,” Ciel said, almost petulantly. He’d thought he’d done a very good job. It wasn’t easy, granting wishes.

“The problem…” Edwin sighed. “It’s really just…” he hesitated. “You haven’t been to my bed once, and—well, that is an expected duty, you realize…”

“What?” Ciel said, flatly. He twisted around to look Edwin in the eye, who after all must be joking. There was absolutely no way this was any sort of expected duty, nor was Ciel going to go along with any such thing.

Edwin’s confidence wavered a bit in the face of Ciel’s steely glare, and he swallowed. But then he straightened up, obviously reminding himself who was in charge here.

“I understand you have your quirks,” he said, “but this is non-negotiable.”

“Brown—” Ciel started, darkly.

“It’s an order.”

Ciel went quiet, his fists clenched in the fabric of his dress. He took a deep breath, and let coldness fall over his face until nothing at all could leak through, except the fury in his eyes.

“Oh, is it?” he said.

“Margaret,” Edwin said, “please don’t make this awkward.”

Ciel smiled thinly. “Of course, husband,” he said. He stood up. “Well, I have a busy schedule today, so I’ll be going then.”

“Maggie—”

“I’m sure I’ll see you tonight,” Ciel said, with exaggerated care, turning before Edwin could answer and walking as fast as could reasonably be considered proper for a lady until he had made it out of the room.

Not that it could be considered proper at all for a lady to blow up at her husband like that. For something that was, after all, expected of the arrangement.

Somehow, Ciel had never thought that their particular one, with its ulterior motives, would be held to the same standard. He hadn’t prepared himself at all, and now he made it all the way out of the breakfast room and down the hall until into his own rooms, the only place he could be reasonably sure Edwin wouldn’t enter.

He considered breaking the deal. This was not a new thought, for Ciel was impatient, easily angered, and didn’t take well to orders; but this was the first time the thought was more than an idle consideration, a momentary rage. 

He wasn’t sure he could do this. 

But—if he didn’t—he forfeited Edwin’s soul, that sweet concoction that seemed more tempting each day; and he would be stuck with the same gnawing hunger, that impossibly empty void that had already grown so much he felt light-headed (and not just because of the torturous contraption of corsets).

After all of this hard work!

Ciel paced around his room, grabbing things at random—books, hairbrushes, perfumes—and throwing them wildly at the walls until they broke. At last, with nowhere else to go, he sank down against the wall, pulling his hands up through his hair and leaning his head back. It was so hard to think, with every gasp for breath, with every day that passed hungry, with every wish of Edwin’s, with this order heavy in his mind like a stone, telling him what he would most certainly do. Preparations must be made. Forms must be kept to. There was no doing otherwise.

Unless he broke the contract.

And then?

Finding Sebastian again? Stealing some soul, like he was no better than a thief? Reduced to such a menial scavenging out of nothing but pride…

But… could he bear…

“Surely I must,” Ciel said, to the empty room, in the voice that no longer sounded like his own. “I survived it before…” the voice wavered, and Ciel hated it. “This is nothing like that time… And Edwin wouldn’t hurt his ‘wife’, he is much too fond of her. He doesn’t have a sadistic nature, he is just a selfish, greedy fool, in over his head in something he doesn’t understand.”

This was all true; Ciel knew it. But it did not stop the racing panic in his chest. It did not stop the words that rose unbidden to his mind, to call for Sebastian, to order him to get rid of everything in Ciel’s way.

Well.

His schedule was not very crowded after all; he’d had nothing so pressing that it couldn’t be thrown aside in favor of sitting hunched up in his room, digging teeth into his skin and trying to remember how to breathe, until the sun had gone down. And he still had not broken the contract.

So Ciel got up, putting everything in order, changing out of his dress and corset alone, too fast, with the application of a bit of hasty magic to help with stays and buttons, taking a moment to stand and trying not to black out, putting on a nightgown, walking into Edwin’s rooms.

 

_ The two waiting voids stared in through the dirt-streaked window, a tall man in a pristine butler’s uniform, and a boy, perching haughtily on the thin strip of brick. _

_ “Am I to take it, then, that you are not going to answer?” Sebastian asked. He paused, and then, carefully, continued. “Perhaps that is for the best. After all, contracts are challenging things; it might be wiser to scavenge for your first meal.” _

_ “Are you implying that I am a coward?” Ciel asked, turning back to face his butler with burning eyes. Sebastian might have agreed, and while that would have fuelled Ciel’s rage, he knew to be on his guard for Sebastian’s tricks and taunts. _

_ What he still hadn’t gotten used to was the lack of them. _

_ “No, my lord,” Sebastian said flatly. “Forgive me if my words have construed any kind of offense.” _

_ It was like his balance was off, as though gravity had moved slightly akilter. I know what you were going to say, Ciel thought. I know what you wanted to say. _

_ But did I? _

_ The eerie dark eyes over that mask-face did not seem to want anything, anymore.  _

_ “Even if I don’t make an agreement, it might be amusing to play with him a bit before we go,” Ciel said, pointedly casual, slipping insubstantial through the glass to hover as a sudden darkness in the room. In the momentary silence, beyond the shocked gasp of the summoner, Ciel could hear the almost imperceptible creak of the window being pushed up and soft footsteps walking surely through the cluttered room to stand behind him. _

 

Ciel had picked out his maidservant, carefully, as someone who did not tire him so much as some girls might. Of course, the outcome of this was that Cora tended to be quite sharp-eyed, with a quick wit, and she did not miss much. It made sense, now, how much Sebastian had enjoyed being the anomaly disguised in plain sight, brazening past impossibilities with the sheer force of his personality. Ciel never did have that kind of power, but his ingénue eyes were just as convincing green as blue. And he was not having to hide bodies around every corner (as amusing as that might have been).

Ciel must have been complaining about Edwin again. Cora, who was very patient with a hairbrush through long red tresses, nodded and let him continue until he had progressed to a sullen silence.

“Mistress,” she said at last. “May I speak plainly?”

Ciel met her dark, watchful eyes in the mirror and motioned peremptorily. “Of course, Cora.”

“Why did you marry Mr. Brown? It wasn’t a child, you know, that’s what I thought at first,”

Ciel almost choked—how awful! He couldn’t even imagine  _ that _ , he thought, shuddering.

“Are you all right?”

He waved her away. “I’m fine.”

“I mean… it wasn’t for love; and, to be frank, he never had any money before he married you. It’s just, a girl like you,” she said, admiringly, “you had to have had options. Why did you choose him?”

It was a question that left Ciel tongue-tied, for a moment. Why had he decided on this, of all possible contracts, all possible people? Edwin Brown wasn’t the worst man to ever summon a demon; but the availability of worse options didn’t explain it. Ciel had been hungry, and Edwin had been available, and that made Ciel sound like a whore.

“I made a hasty decision,” Ciel said, at last. “I’m not sure I really thought it through.”

“Well,” Cora said, when the silence had become too long, too loud. “It happens.”

 

_ The man, at last, began to fidget and he looked around the room. His eyes strayed to Sebastian and he cleared his throat.  _

_ “Uh… Margaret,” he said awkwardly, “is there a reason there’s a butler standing in the room?” _

_ “He’s my butler,” Ciel said, his other hand clenched tightly over the one with the contract seal. _

_ “I don’t need a butler,” Edwin explained patiently. “I just need money and a wife.” _

_ “Edwin,” Ciel snapped. “Perhaps you don’t understand. Sebastian comes with me.” _

_ “What would that look like to everyone?” Edwin said. “You being followed around by such a well-dressed…” he glanced toward Sebastian again, and away. “Well, it just wouldn’t do! Get rid of him!” _

_ Ciel’s eyes widened, and then he narrowed them, sneering. “Listen,” he said cuttingly. “Sebastian is the best butler you’ll ever meet, and he’s very good at his job—much better than whatever mediocre butler you’re keeping around.” _

_ “I don’t need a butler,” Edwin said. _

_ “I trained him myself,” Ciel retorted indignantly. _

_ “ _ That’s an order _ ,” Edwin said. _

_ Ciel fell silent.  _

_ I won’t do it, he thought. There’s no way he can make me send away my own servant. I— _

_ “Sebastian,” he said, with a shaking voice, “Leave us. That’s an order.” _

_ Sebastian met his eyes, and then, silently, he stepped back, and bowed. “Yes, my lord,” he replied at last, almost inaudibly, before turning for the still-open window and jumping out into the night. _

_ Ciel watched him go, his mouth half-open. But I never meant to say that, he thought. He wasn’t supposed to leave. He felt, with sudden nausea, a memory of the last time Sebastian had left at his order, hitting him with sudden force. Claude, and his meddling, creeping ways… the cold horror of that red ring, the uncertainty in his own mind as to his own past, his own name… he’d thought the terror had faded over time, but it had just been waiting to spring up again. _

_ For a long moment, Ciel did nothing. Time suspended immeasurably, the past and the present blurring into one another with a weighted tension. He could not move. _

_ “Is that ordinary?” Edwin said. “A demon having a contract like this, with another demon? I’ve never heard of such a thing.” _

_ “...It’s not.” _

_ Ciel turned back, slowly, from the empty window, feeling the mark on his eye fading back to red-pupiled slits as he regarded his contractor… his master.  _

_ I will very much enjoy tearing you to pieces, he thought.  _

 

I’ve never done this before, Ciel thought. And then—of  _ course _ he had never done anything like this before. This was his first contract, and he was stumbling through it without a guide except his memories of Sebastian.

What was his first contract like? Ciel wondered, at last. I never thought about it. I never wished to ask him, or even to speculate. It was as though he was created just for me, as though nothing at all had existed before we met.

This was exactly how a contractor should feel, Ciel supposed. When one owns a genie, one usually does not think to ask its life story. And perhaps that privacy, existing between the cracks of what could be ordered and what would be ordered, was the bastion of continuity, the only one possible.

But did  _ he _ care about that? Did time even flow the same way, for him? Or had Sebastian really meant it when he said that he had made himself anew, a life unconnected by any previous experience?

No. It couldn’t have been that. Even hunger would not explain his grief now, if that had been the case.

A life without a self couldn’t mourn.

Edwin let his hands rest, hesitantly, on Ciel’s skin, watching him as though he would bolt. There was a conflictedness in the angles of his face, his palpable unease at the stiff uncertain way Ciel rested beneath him. It was a flicker of darkness, this choice. Oh, some part of him knew that what he was doing went beyond wrong, and this man had never learned to revel in wickedness.

Ciel smiled, relaxing, dancing his fingertips across Edwin’s chest.

“What’s the matter?” he whispered.

And Edwin allowed himself to believe to lie. He continued.

Another measure of tarnish on his soul, a little deepening of his flavor that Ciel could almost taste. He swallowed, mouth dry, entranced at his palpable influence, the little bit of sin he had painted his meal in. It seemed to exude from the human’s pores, it filled his scent, his mouth. Even the mechanics of bodies moving was easy to ignore when this soul was so close—almost close enough to consume.

Easy enough to ignore.

Ciel licked the spent from Edwin’s body, finding that it didn’t bother him at all; this piece of his master, his doomed inamorato, this fly in his own web; what a wonderful appetizer before the main event.


	2. His Master, Considering

Seduction had been a game that even the child Ciel had been had known how to play. Oh, it could be grating, to talk sweetly to men while fantasizing about tearing them apart, to placate his fiancee while squinting at obnoxious decorations, thinking only that he wished she wouldn’t cry. But with Sebastian, it had always been just another way of speaking, looks that promised without promising; perhaps the complicated nature of that relationship between master/meal and servant/beast required it. It had meant so much, without meaning anything at all.

Sebastian might make innuendo, might let his touches linger gently just too long, but he had never made the move from teasing to action, and Ciel wondered why.

If it was such an easy way to gain a taste of what the demon craved, why deny himself? Was it part of his butler aesthetic, this starving of every possible sweet, in order to build up anticipation for the finish? 

Perhaps he knew that it would have tilted the already precarious balance Ciel resided under. Perhaps he thought Ciel would have ordered him not to. Would he have, though? Ciel had been so young, so unsure, even in his arrogance.

Had there been something more pleasing in his innocence than in his corruption? What; if it was corruption, in every way, that made the soul so good—that Sebastian never hesitated to cultivate in him in any other way?

Sebastian played the glutton, but he seemed so much more the ascetic, in a certain turn of the light. He reveled in violence, and minimized bloodshed; he was hungry and starved himself, loved pain and was gentle.

Another game Sebastian played with himself? 

And how much was his own making, and how much was Ciel’s?

 

* * *

 

The contract ended, and all those chains that Ciel had twisted himself in vanished, leaving him light enough to float, insubstantial enough to dissipate into the earth, as though he might never come back. But as always, he returned to that frowning building at last, where the one inhabitant resided, always, in an unrestful haunt, pulled by that last chain, that thread that held him fast from leaping, in pieces, from one glittering sunbeam to another, never to return.

Lizzie was still well, and her children, as well as he could keep them with every protection. Edwin’s affairs had been settled, his money dispersed, his wife vanished, her maidservant, along with the other servants, armed with recommendations and a generous gift from Edwin’s will.

And Sebastian still remained. 

It’s not like I need him still, Ciel thought, as he hesitated upon the doorstep. He pushed it open, feeling the old wood protest, the musty smell of an unlived-in place, the pristine, dust-free surfaces, the scoured walls.

What would it be like, to free him? Not for Sebastian’s gratitude, for Ciel presumed he would have none. Perhaps he would disappear, never to return—perhaps he would spend his anger in lashing out at Ciel, fighting him, perhaps he would even manage to kill him somehow.

(The contract mark in his own eye was no longer visible unless he wished it, and yet it was always present, a reassuring pain.)

It was what Sebastian wanted, after all. He had so much as asked, manipulating Ciel into making the deal as he did. What other situation could have brought the truth to light? What else could have made Ciel think about the other side of this agreement?

Would it really be so much trouble, to do this one thing for a servant who had been so loyal?

And if he did, what of Ciel would be left?

He had only ever been two things, since his world was shattered: a frightened, powerless boy, and Sebastian’s. He had been that for so long he did not know what would be left, if he took that away; what shape the pieces might make. Or if they would make anything at all.


End file.
